Michael J. Haworth: What is Trump hiding?

Donald Trump’s son, Eric, said, “Nepotism is a beautiful thing.” Yes, he actually said that. And he may have let the cat out of the bag the other day when he said to a British reporter, “If there was anything the strike (on Syria) did, it was to validate the fact that there’s no Russia tie.”

This begs the question, did Trump use Syria’s president Bashar al-Assad’s chemical attack on his own people as an excuse to send a 59-Tomahawk cruise missile message not only to Assad, but also to distance himself from Syria’s ally Russia and the ongoing election hacking investigation? Did Trump, during his “most delicious chocolate cake” interlude, seize this opportunity to kill two birds with one stone? Isn’t it a bit suspicious that the one-time bromance between Trump and Putin has inexplicably grown icy cold in recent weeks?

The Russia connection just won’t go away. In addition to election hacking, the Trump tax return issue must be solved. His returns from at least the last several years must be made available for public scrutiny. Thousands of activists and Democratic lawmakers across the country on Tax Day marched with messages in big, bold letters asking, “Donald Trump ... What Are You Hiding? Trump’s 2005 tax return, which magically appeared in journalist David Cay Johnston’s email account and was displayed on MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow show, contained zero details regarding investments, only showing income and taxes paid. The speculation is that Trump released it himself in order to satisfy the curious. Nice try.

Trump’s excuse for not releasing his tax information is due to “an ongoing audit.” White House press secretary Sean Spicer doubled down on that falsehood on April 17. The Internal Revenue Service has repeatedly stated that audits have no bearing whatsoever on one’s ability to make tax returns public. So, Don, armed with that information we continue to ask, what exactly are you hiding?

We need to know where his investments lie in order to make him accountable for the decisions he’ll be making concerning Russia and other nations during his term in office, however long that may be. We need to know his decisions are being made for the American people, and not just for Trump, Inc.